My younger self would have loved Baba O’Riley. Vocalist Roger Daltrey offered a different take on the meaning of “Baba O’Riley” in a 2018 interview with Big Issue, suggesting the song has a broader message that is also applicable to today’s youth - and not just because they like to get wasted, too: The conditions at Woodstock were known to be much worse, with three days of rain and chaos capped off by Jimi Hendrix’s legendary performance of “Star-Spangled Banner”. And I’m describing a festival in the modern era. It feels like you’re clinging on to the final moments of your youth, just fighting to stay alive, and of course trying to get as wasted as possible. Whether its about Woodstock, Isle of Wight, or some other music festival, “Baba O’Riley” describes the restless ambition that one feels when surrounded by a crowd of people at a large communal event where people take psychedelic drugs. On other occasion, he also said that the lyric “teenage wasteland” was inspired by the trash left on the field after the 1969 Isle of Wight Festival. Townsend has been known to contradict himself when discussing the meanings of his songs. The irony was that some listeners took the song to be a teenage celebration: ‘Teenage Wasteland, yes! We’re all wasted!'” Pete Townsend on the meaning of “Baba O’ Riley, 2009. The absolute desolation of teenagers at Woodstock, where audience members were strung out on acid and 20 people had brain damage. He spoke about this in a 2009 issue of Guitar World: However, while that was a working title for the song, guitarist and songwriter Pete Townsend ended up using the title for a similar ballad on his solo album Lifehouse.Īccording to Townsend, he was originally inspired to write “Baba O’Riley” after seeing the sorry state of the kids at Woodstock, where The Who famously performed alongside Jimi Hendrix, the Grateful Dead, and more in August of 1969. In fact, many forget that the song is called “Baba O’Riley” and simply refer to it as “Teenage Wasteland” instead. As the opening track to their seminal 1971 album Who’s Next, the song has become an anthem for the unsettled youth, with the repeated phrase “Teenage Wasteland” being the most memorable and often-cited lyric. The Who’s “Baba O’Riley” is one of the British rock band’s many classic songs.
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